Written by: Slawka Grabowska
The Family Chao, Lan Samantha Chang
New York : Norton & Company Cop., 2022
301 pages
ISBN 978-0-393-86807-4
At Donostia Book Club we start the year 2023 with a new experience and we climb onto the retellings bandwagon. Retellings meaning books reinterpreting a popular story well known to the wide public. The most popular retellings are those of the Greek mythology, but we decided to take a risk with one inspired by Russian literature. The Family Chao by Samantha Chang (there is no Spanish translation yet) is inspired by Fiodór Dostoyevski‘s The Karamozov Brothers with a family of Chinese origin as protagonists.
The Chaos are looking for their own American dream, but each of the three brothers imagines it in a different way. The fact that their father is a tyrant and their mother has just become a Buddhist nun does not help them clarify their ideas and plans for their future. A satire of what life can be like for immigrants and their children in a country so different from their own, of family relationships and with a Chinese restaurant in the middle. Drama that makes us smile more than once. The stereotypes are presented in a fun way, but at the same time make clear the damage they do.
The author, Lan Samantha Chang, apart from The Family Chao, has published two more novels and a book of short stories. The topics that seem to interest her most are the lives of immigrant families, living between two cultures and the creative process. Chang is currently the director of the Writers’ Workshop at the University of Iowa.
We encourage you to read the book with us, on January 9th at 7:00 p.m. you can participate in our meeting both in person and by connecting online. Here we leave you some of the questions about the novel that we are going to try to analyze:
- The Family Chao is divided into two parts: "They See Themselves" and "The World Sees Them". How do these sections differ in terms of tone, narrative voice, and theme? Who is "the world"? Who are “they"? What does this distinction imply for readers? - How does the idea of sacrifice resonate in The Family Chao? What does each character sacrifice? For whom? With what intentions? In what social, political and economic contexts? How do your experiences shape your emotional connection to each character's struggles? - Ming tells James that "America is not a democracy, it's not a place of opportunity...if you can't choose to be white". How does The Family Chao's narrative confirm this claim? - What do you think of O-Lan? How do you relate to her motivations? Do you feel empathy? Anger? Comprehension? To what extent is O-Lan the autonomous character? How might the character of O-Lan relate to the novel's larger themes of visibility and invisibility? - Were you satisfied with the ending of the novel? Did you have any doubts? - Which brother do you relate more to and why? |